1. Technical Field
The present application relates to a beverage bottling plant for filling bottles with a liquid beverage material having a packing station and a rotation station for 2-cornered or n-cornered packages.
2. Background Information
A beverage bottling plant for filling bottles with a liquid beverage filling material can possibly comprise a beverage filling machine with a plurality of beverage filling positions, each beverage filling position having a beverage filling device for filling bottles with liquid beverage filling material. The filling devices may have an apparatus designed to introduce a predetermined volume of liquid beverage filling material into the interior of bottles to a substantially predetermined level of liquid beverage filling material. The apparatus designed to introduce a predetermined flow of liquid beverage filling material further comprises an apparatus that is designed to terminate the filling of the beverage bottles upon the liquid beverage filling material reaching the predetermined level in bottles. There may also be provided a conveyer arrangement that is designed to move bottles, for example, from an inspecting machine to the filling machine. Upon filling, a closing station closes the filled bottles. There may further be provided a conveyer arrangement configured to transfer filled bottles from the filling machine to the closing station. Bottles may be labeled in a labeling station, the labeling station having a conveyer arrangement to receive bottles and to output bottles. The closing station and the labeling station may be connected by a corresponding conveyer arrangement.
A high percentage of retail products are packaged. Tetragonal packages with an essentially flat base surface represent the highest percentage of such products. These packages can be made, for example, of sheet metal, plastic and/or cardboard, paperboard or paper. There are few limitations with regard to the type of goods that can be packaged in these packages, so that almost all products such as, for example, flour, nails, rice, beverages etc. are sold in such packages. These goods are generally produced using mass-production methods which are oriented and optimized toward the production of large quantities, so that, for example, a large number of packages filled with a given product are manufactured in a given unit of time.
To minimize the investment costs and to keep the size of such production facilities as small as possible, it has been found to be particularly advantageous to transport the packages and packing units “end-to-end” as far as possible, i.e. without gaps or spaces between two packages. In this manner, the surface areas and thus also the lengths of the required conveyors can be significantly reduced. This measure likewise increases the stability of the packages as they are being transported.
In the context of the production process, it may be necessary to rotate the packages around their vertical axis for the next process or processing step, whereby in many cases a rotation by 90 degrees is desired.
DE 42 14 321 C2, for example, discloses a device to perform this task. With this device, packages are transported on their underside by conveyor belts that are positioned on opposite ends of this underside, whereby said conveyor belts can be operated at different speeds. At least in a partial segment, between the two conveyor belts there is an additional conveyor belt that removes the packages from the device. On account of the different speeds of the conveyor belts, the packages are first rotated around their vertical axis by an angle of less than 90 degrees by this device as they are being transported. After the packages have left the area of action of the two conveyor belts, the packages are conveyed farther by the middle conveyor belt and then run up against a stop edge, which causes the rotation to be continued. Then the packages arrive in an area where lateral guides are arranged in the shape of a funnel, which cause the desired rotation by 90 degrees to be completed.
Some of the disadvantages of this device are that the packages to be rotated may not be end-to-end and must therefore be separated in advance, and that the impact of the packages against the stop causes an undefined rotation which is essentially left to chance.
The device described by DE 42 14 321 C2 is also suitable only for small production runs.
A similar device is also described in DE 40 36 627. On a device of this type, the packages to be rotated are moved by a conveyor belt with at least two tracks, whereby one track of the conveyor is interrupted by a gap. Inside this gap there is a flat disc or a disk in the shape of a truncated cone that is driven so that it rotates.
The conveyor belts are arranged so that the packages are moved with one of their lower, forward corners onto the disc, whereby first this front corner is accelerated toward the center of the conveyor belt.
As the rotation continues, the bottom longitudinal edge of the package is engaged by the disk and rolls over said disk over almost its entire length. Because the peripheral velocity of the disc is higher at the breakaway points than the belt speed of the conveyor belt, the rotational movement that has been started is continued.
As a result of the arrangement of the lateral guides and/or the advantageous control of the speed of the conveyor belt that is adjacent to the disc, the desired 90 degree rotation is completed.
On this device, too, it is necessary for the packages to be rotated not to arrive at the device end to end, but with spaces in between. The rotation is also essentially undefined, so that it is doubtful that it could be used for higher-speed production. Finally, DE 30 43 469 C2 describes an additional device for the 90 degree rotation of packages. On this device, the rotation is effected by deflector parts located on a vertical axis of rotation.
These deflector parts first pause in a position in which they are capable of receiving a package as it is delivered to them. When this package strikes the deflector parts, a rotational movement by 90 degrees is initiated. The lateral surfaces or edges of the package that are facing away from the deflector parts thereby arrive in the area of action of a driven friction conveyor belt, which by guiding and transporting the lateral surfaces or edges acts on the package so that its rotational movement is effectively assisted.
When the rotation of a package has been completed, the deflector parts once again pause in their receiving position until another package has entered the device.
Of course, the rotation in this device is essentially controlled and defined, although the need for the spaces between the individual packages and the discontinuous operation do not promote high rates or speeds of production.